Fighting for the Sake of Fighting — Of all the bad reasons to persist in a failed effort, this has to be one of the worst. Continuing in a fight simply to avoid the embarrassment of admitting that the fight was always pointless is absurd. There are no good ways “out” for House Republicans at this point, but there are better and worse ways to react to the failure of the defunders’ gambit.

The Lonely War Of Marlin Stutzman — A largely unremarked element of the etiology of the prion disease currently afflicting the Republican party -- and therefore, alas, the country -- is the carefully cultivated, and by now deeply inculcated, sense of conservative victimhood that has been a prime element of conservatism's emotional appeal since long before Richard Nixon rose to power on it. They are always beset. They are always besieged.

Interesting thing about the faecal transplant treatment - C-diff is so awful that, I understand, when offered the treatment people who have it take not a moment to wrinkle their noses in disgust: they just accept eagerly. Grossness is very much in the mind of the beholder. Or the sufferer.